Can the AI agent transfer a live call to a person, and how does call forwarding work?
Yes. The Call forwarding step in an agent's workflow hands a live call to another phone number or to another AI agent. There is also a human handoff option for passing a conversation to a person.
- Add a Conversation node before the transfer so the caller is not just cut off, for example: Let me connect you with someone, please hold a moment.
- Add the Call forwarding step and choose who to forward to.
- Set the days and hours the forward is attempted, for example Monday to Friday, 9 to 5, or all day every day. Use the outside hours branch to decide what happens after hours.
- Choose the outbound caller ID number.
- Decide on the confirm key (see below).
Confirm key and whisper message: by default the person receiving the call hears a whisper message, such as press 1 to accept, and must press the key to take the call. We recommend leaving it on. Without it every forward is a blind transfer: if you forward to a cell phone, the system cannot tell whether a person answered or whether the call reached that phone's voicemail or the business's hold music, so your caller can end up in someone's voicemail. With the confirm key on, if nobody presses 1 the call goes down the No answer branch and the AI takes over again. It also lets the person decide whether they can take a call at that moment. If you do not want confirmation, remove the whisper message and the call is forwarded directly.
AI picks: add several numbers, each with instructions, and the AI chooses where to send the call, for example billing questions to one person and customer service or anything else to another. You can add as many options as you want.
You can combine forwarding with a Decision node or AI routes, for example forward only high value callers, or for an urgent call such as a plumbing emergency forward to the owner or text them, even at 2 AM. Every other workflow step also works during a live call, so the agent can send text messages and emails while on the phone.